Field
The present disclosure relates generally to electronics, and more specifically to transmitters and receivers.
Background
In a radio frequency (RF) transceiver, a communication signal is typically received and downconverted by receive circuitry, sometimes referred to as a receive chain. A receive chain typically includes a receive filter, a low noise amplifier (LNA), a mixer, a local oscillator (LO), a voltage controlled oscillator (VCO), a baseband filter, and other components, to recover the information contained in the communication signal. The transceiver also includes circuitry that enables the transmission of a communication signal to a receiver in another transceiver. The transceiver may be able to operate over multiple frequency ranges, typically referred to a frequency bands. Moreover, a single transceiver may be configured to operate using multiple carrier signals that may occur in the same frequency band, but that may not overlap in actual frequency, an arrangement referred to as non-contiguous carriers.
In a cellular communication environment, the number of radio frequency (RF) carriers allocated to the end-user is limited because it is difficult to determine the available spectrum and sufficient spectrum must remain available to meet various quality of service (QOS) commitments. As a result, often there is unused spectrum. Wireless service providers have only a limited knowledge of the available spectrum around each user and around each user equipment (UE). A receiver in a UE, such as a mobile telephone, generally does not allow for a periodic analysis of the radio spectrum available to the UE.
Therefore, it would be desirable to have a way for a UE to obtain a periodic analysis of the spectrum available at a given time.